Fire in Bone: A Jake Pettman Thriller Read online

  Fire in Bone

  A Jake Pettman Thriller by

  Wes Markin

  Contents

  About the Author

  By Wes Markin

  1975

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  1975

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  1990

  NOW

  AFTER …

  BLUE FALLS

  AN EXCLUSIVE EXTRACT OF THE NEXT JAKE PETTMAN THRILLER

  Also by Wes Markin

  Also by Wes Markin

  Also by Wes Markin

  Also by Wes Markin

  Also by Wes Markin

  Also by Wes Markin

  Also by Wes Markin

  Also by Wes Markin

  Acknowledgments

  Stay in touch

  Review

  About the Author

  Wes Markin is a hyperactive English teacher, who loves writing crime fiction with a twist of the macabre.

  Born in 1978, Wes grew up in Manchester, UK. After graduating from Leeds University, he spent fifteen years as a teacher of English, and has taught in Thailand, Malaysia and China. Now as a teacher, writer, husband and father, he is currently living in Harrogate, UK.

  Praise for One Last Prayer for the Rays

  “An explosive and visceral debut with the most terrifying of killers. Wes Markin is a new name to watch out for in crime fiction, and I can’t wait to see more of DCI Yorke.” – Stephen Booth, Bestselling Crime Author

  “A pool of blood, an abduction, swirling blizzards, a haunting mystery, yes, Wes Markin’s One Last Prayer for the Rays has all the makings of an absorbing thriller. I recommend that you give it a go.” – Alan Gibbons, Bestselling Author

  By Wes Markin

  DCI Yorke Thrillers

  A Lesson in Crime

  One Last Prayer for the Rays

  The Repenting Serpent

  The Silence of Severance

  Rise of the Rays

  Dance with the Reaper

  Christmas with the Conduit

  Jake Pettman Thrillers

  The Killing Pit

  Fire in Bone

  Blue Falls

  Details of how to claim your FREE

  DCI Michael Yorke quick read, A Lesson in Crime,

  can be found at the end of the book.

  This story is a work of fiction. All names, characters, organizations, places, events and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to any persons, alive or dead, events or locals is entirely coincidental.

  Text copyright © 2021 Wes Markin

  First published 2021

  ISBN: 9798720407186

  Imprint: Dark Heart Publishing

  Edited by Brian Paone

  Cover design by Cherie Foxley

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book should be reproduced in any way without the express permission of the author.

  For Roger M – Never Forgotten

  1975

  THE HEAT PRESSED down on Charlotte White. “I don’t remember it being anywhere near this hot last year.”

  On the other side of the table, Ryan let his spoon sink into his cereal bowl and laughed. “Your memory is letting you down again. In fact, I remember us having this very same conversation.”

  She undid the top button on her blouse. “Okay, so what was your suggestion then?”

  His eyes widened. “Carry on with those buttons, and I’ll give you a great suggestion.”

  She slapped his hand. “You’ve a teenage son upstairs.”

  “Did you have to remind me? Okay … let me see, last year … yes, we went on a long, cooling walk by the Stinson and had a picnic by the old Waterford Mill.”

  “I remember. It was fun, even with Bobby sulking over a girl.”

  Ryan rolled his eyes. “Can’t say I recall. Didn’t he spend his entire fourteenth year sulking? Personally, I remember the hum of fireflies and the gentle breeze over the lake …”

  She squeezed the top of his hand. “Stop pretending to be a poet.”

  He turned over his hand and took hold of hers. “There’s more of the poet in me than you’ll ever realize.”

  “Go on then. Indulge me with this romantic side. Please. I’ve been holding out for it for seventeen years.”

  He grinned. “Well, let me get you to that patch by Waterford’s, and I’ll show you that side. If I remember correctly, the place was quite desolate last time round.”

  “With Bobby in tow? Please don’t make promises you cannot keep. Especially those kinds of promises.” She bit her lip.

  “Bobby’s in bed. He still will be by the afternoon. Do we really want to be heading out in the hottest part of the day with a grumpy teenager? Let’s go now and pick up some supplies along the way. We’ll probably be back before he’s even up!”

  She gave Ryan a long stare, wanting him to believe that she was giving his suggestion careful consideration. However, it was a bugbear of hers how long Bobby was spending in bed these days, and she’d been trying her best to knock the sloth-like habit from him, falling just short of violence. “It sounds fantastic, honey, but he might like to come.”

  “You are joking!”

  “Well, maybe not like, but he’ll definitely enjoy it when he’s out with us, and you know how much I like it when we’re all together.”

  Ryan wriggled his hand free of hers, and his playful expression fell away.

  "Sorry, I do want us all to spend time together, honey. Just me and you. I’ll make it up to you, I promise.”

  “Of course,” he said, nodding yet avoiding eye contact.

  She sighed. Ryan never dealt well with rejection. “Let me go upstairs and wrestle the argumentative little adolescent from his bed. Then I'll make us all coffee, and we’ll put together a picnic.” A knock at the door startled her, and she put her hand to her chest. “Do they always have to knock so damn hard?” She watched Ryan rise to his feet and approach the front door. Even after all these years, after all their ups and downs, and even after his brief affair earlier in the marriage, she adored him more than life.

  As he opened the door, she slipped past him for the stairs.

  She heard a deep, elderly voice. “Good morning. Carrs Deliveries.”

  “Jesus, what’s in that?” Ryan asked.

  “It’s a big one, alright. Good thing we replaced the trolleys last week; I don’t think the old ones would have handled it.”

  “There’s no way that’s anything I’ve ordered," Ryan said.

  The delivery man laughed. “Wives, eh? You should see the shit that comes through my door!”

  The sound of the conversation faded as Charlotte climbed the stairs and turned down the hallway for her son’s room. He was a fifteen-year-old boy, so he required a courteous knock. However, he only ever got the one. If he didn’t answer, she’d enter regardless.

  She flattened the dogeared corners of the poster tacked to his door that read, Unless you’re delivering pizza, I’m busy! as she waited.

  “Pizza!” she said loudly.

  Nothing.

  Well, you were warned. She opened the door. “Sleepyhead, we have a plan—”

  Every part of her body c
rumbled.

  Ryan circled the three-foot-by-three-foot cardboard box. He paused, bent forward, and ran a finger over the thick wad of masking tape that sealed it. He straightened upright and tried pushing the box with his foot, but it didn’t move. What the hell have you bought, Charlotte?

  He went to grab a knife from the kitchen to attack the tape with. He heard the rumble of the departing delivery man’s diesel engine. The company, Carrs Deliveries, had a reputation for being cowboys of the highest order; broken deliveries, products left outside to be stolen, and brushes with the law for so-called medicinal deliveries were just the tip of the iceberg. When Ryan had asked for the name of the sender, the delivery man had given a name he didn’t recognize—Blake Marsh, owner of Marsh Properties. What could Charlotte have possibly ordered from a property company?

  From upstairs, Charlotte called his name.

  “Are you okay, honey?” he asked, splitting the tape on the box. Holding his knife in one hand, he reached for one of the flaps on the box to open it as he heard his wife bounding down the stairs.

  “Bobby’s not in his bed!”

  He took a sharp breath through his nose and looked up at his stunned wife. He thought for a moment. “Henry’s! That’s where he’ll be.”

  She shook her head. “No … it’s not like him. He’d have told us.”

  He felt a cold sensation starting up his hands. “He’s fifteen. I pushed a lot of boundaries when I was fifteen. Call Henry’s mom. He’s there. I know it.” But even as he said it, he didn’t believe it. Not just because Bobby was very rule bound and would have told them, but because this entire situation was very peculiar.

  Carrs Deliveries.

  Marsh Properties.

  He spied the box, and the cold sensation moved into his stomach.

  “What’s in the box?” She was no longer shouting, nor was she whispering. It sounded more like a hiss—the sound of something deflating.

  With his cold hand trembling, he leaned forward, lifted back a flap, and looked inside. He jumped backward, holding the knife in front of him.

  “What’s happening, Ryan? What’s in the box?”

  “Someone …”

  “Who?”

  Ryan slowly shook his head as the cold sensation squeezed his stomach, forcing his breakfast up.

  “Who? Ryan?”

  Once certain the person in the box was completely still and posed no threat, he eyed Charlotte on the staircase.

  She’d slipped into a sitting position and was clutching the railings.

  He opened his mouth to speak, but nothing came out.

  “Oh god … Is it Bobby? Speak … please. Is it Bobby?”

  “No.”

  “Thank god … thank god!” Tears rolled down her cheeks.

  “Someone with blond hair.”

  “Thank god … thank god.”

  “They’re wrapped in plastic.” He felt his breakfast climbing his throat and into his mouth. “Who’d put someone in a box? This is sick … fucking sick. Why here? Why bring them to us? Call the police. Call them!”

  “I can’t move.” She closed her eyes and rested her head against the railing. “Where’s Bobby? What’s happening, Ryan? Please, tell me what’s happening!”

  He had no idea. He approached the box again. Despite the vise-like grip of the cold sensation that had now spread throughout his entire body, Ryan sweated hard. It ran down his face and back. He knelt, opened a flap, and looked in. “Jesus … fuck.” Ryan forced himself to stay there long enough to determine the person in the box was definitely dead.

  The victim had been placed in a sitting position, hugging their knees. The head rested forward, so the face was hidden, but Ryan didn’t want to touch the young man or the thin plastic he was wrapped in. He didn’t need to. Ryan recognized the brown leather jacket and the tangles in the blond hair.

  He turned from the box, put a fist to his mouth, and tried for a deep breath through his nose.

  But it was too late.

  His breakfast hit the floor.

  Charlotte banged her head hard against the railings, praying she’d wake. It didn’t work. Because this is real. Now, get control of yourself. It isn’t Bobby, remember?

  Listening to her husband retching, she rose to her feet and worked her way down the stairs. Her legs were shaky, but she used the bannister to steady herself. At the bottom of the stairs, she turned to Ryan. “Who is it?”

  He wiped vomit from his chin, opened his mouth to speak, but then retched again.

  “Who, Ryan? Who is it?”

  “Henry,” Ryan managed to squeeze out between retches. “It’s Henry.”

  Charlotte put her hand to her mouth as her husband fought to a standing position, using the wall as support. She looked down at the box.

  “No!”

  She looked back up.

  Ryan regarded her sadly. “Don’t look in the box.”

  “Where is Bobby?”

  “I don’t know, but we’ll find him.”

  She flinched and looked away. She took a deep breath, tried to ignore her heart as it thrashed against her ribcage, and fought the quivering in both her nerves and muscles to go for the phone sitting by the sofa. She dialled, then watched Ryan.

  He nodded in her direction, clearly satisfied that she was calling the police.

  Except she wasn’t.

  “Hello.”

  “Sylvia, I’m sorry.”

  “Char, is that you? What’s wrong?”

  Charlotte saw Ryan’s look of surprise. When he realized what she was doing, he shook his head, wanting her to stop.

  “Did Bobby stay over with Henry last night?” Charlotte asked.

  “No. Not that I know of.”

  Charlotte spied the box again and turned her back to it.

  “Why’re you asking?” Sylvia asked.

  “Bobby’s not here. I got up this morning, and his bed’s empty.”

  Silence. Immediately lost for words. Empathising with this dreaded experience. Every parent’s worst nightmare, and she’d be desperate not to say the wrong thing. “I’m sure we can find out why. I’ll go to Henry now.”

  But you can’t, can you? Because Henry’s in a box in our living room. But Bobby will be there, in Henry’s room. Because he has to be. I don’t know why, and I don’t know how, but he will be. She steadied herself against the windowsill on which the phone sat.

  Ryan came alongside her and put a hand on her arm. “The police, we have to phone the police.”

  She brushed away his hand.

  “It’s not right to phone his mother.”

  She glared at him.

  She heard the clatter of the phone being picked up again and Sylvia’s desperate voice. “Shit … shit …”

  “Sylvia?”

  “Henry’s not there.”

  “Bobby?”

  Silence. “No. Where are they? What are they up to?”

  Charlotte tasted bile. Henry’s dead, Sylvia, but I won’t tell you that. I couldn’t hear those words, so how could I expect you to? It’s not my place. But where’s my son? “Are you sure Bobby’s not there, Sylvia?”

  “Why’d you keep asking me that? If Henry isn’t here, why would Bobby be here?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “They’ve been hanging around with another boy a lot recently … what’s his name? There’s a van pulling up in our drive.”

  “What van?” Charlotte grabbed her net curtain, as if it was this house it had arrived at and not Sylvia’s.

  “Just Carrs. Another broken package, probably.”

  “Don’t answer the door!”

  “Char, it’s just a delivery.”

  “Believe me, you can’t open the door!”

  “But Sean has already gone outside to help. So, do you have the number of that other boy’s family?”

  “Sylvia, please … stop Sean!”

  “Why? I don’t understand, Charlotte. You’re not making any sense. He’s helping the delivery man, and j
eez, it’s a large parcel—heavy too, by the looks of it.”

  Charlotte screamed and dropped the phone. It bounced off the wall. Feeling her husband’s hands on her shoulders, she collapsed to her knees.

  Time passed. She wasn’t sure how long, but when she recovered her senses, she was clutching the net curtain she must have torn from the railing as she’d gone down and was looking up at Chief Earl Jewell.

  “Bobby?” she asked.

  Earl opened his mouth to answer, but knowing what was coming, she didn’t bother to wait and, instead, screamed all over again.

  1

  “THE SKWEDA,” PARKER said, wading into the black river, “it translates to fire in bone.”

  “Fire in what?” Scarlett asked, sliding down her panties.

  “Fire in bone. The Abenaki Indians named it.” He dove under the surface.

  “Prick.” She tested the water with her toes and snapped her foot back. Too cold for her, but then, everything was too cold for her. Last year, the doctor had written it off as anaemia and had given her some iron tablets. They’d made little difference, much to the displeasure of her father, who really couldn’t stand her costly interactions with the thermostat in winter.

  She waited for Parker to break through the surface.

  Nothing.

  Prick.

  When he did eventually burst out, dramatically gulping for air, she folded her arms. Exhibitionist.